System and method of high-resolution digital data image transmission

ABSTRACT

A system and method for transmitting still images and a video feed from an unmanned aerial vehicle to a ground station is disclosed. The system includes an aircraft including a digital video camera to capture still images and video frames of an object. A video encoder is coupled to the camera to provide a video output including video packets. A file server is coupled to the camera to provide a still image output including image data packets. A multiplexer is coupled to the video output and the still image output. The multiplexer produces a data transmission including the video packets and the image data packets. A transmitter sends the data transmission to the ground station. The ground station receives the data transmission and demultiplexes the packets into separate video and image data packets. The ground control station may select the ratio the video stream images in relation to the still image to be transmitted from the aircraft.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present disclosure relates generally to transmission of both a stillimage and a video stream and, more particularly, to a system that allowsthe combination of transmission of a still image while maintaining avideo stream from an aircraft to a ground station.

BACKGROUND

The way that the Vietnam War is now remembered as the helicopter war,the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan may be remembered for theuse of unmanned drones or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Drones mayfacilitate remote intelligence gathering, alleviating the need for footsoldiers to enter into hostile areas “blind,” with little or noinformation about the location and strength of hostile forces. Dronesmay provide close combat support, such as identifying and eliminatingtargets of interest, alleviating the need to expose soldiers and/orairmen to potential small arms fire, mortars, rocket grenades, road-sidebombs, anti-aircraft weaponry, missiles, and other dangers.

Identification of targets and reconnaissance typically involvesanalyzing video images acquired from cameras carried by the drones. Suchcameras may maintain a real time video feed that tracks targets as theymove or change over a long period of time. Since video involves sendingmultiple still frame images from a camera each second, streaming videorequires a great deal of bandwidth. Maintaining such a large bandwidthis a challenge both for aircraft video systems that must process andstream the raw video data and ground stations that have limitedbandwidth to receive the video feed. One of the tradeoffs to addressthese concerns is that video quality is degraded by either lowering theresolution (e.g. number of pixels) and/or reducing the image frame ratein order to decrease the required bandwidth. Thus, a video feed allows aremote operator to follow a target, but it does not provide a highresolution image of the target for detailed analysis.

Thus, there is a need for better image transmission from unmanned aerialvehicles.

BRIEF SUMMARY

Aspects of the present disclosure include a system for transmittingstill images and a video feed to a remote location. The system includesan aircraft having a digital video camera to capture still images andvideo frames of an object. A video encoder is coupled to the camera toprovide a video output including video packets. A file server is coupledto the camera to provide a still image output including image datapackets. A multiplexer is coupled to the video output and the stillimage output. The multiplexer produces a data transmission including thevideo packets and the image data packets. A transmitter sends the datatransmission to the remote location.

Another example is a system for receiving a combined data transmissionof video stream packets and image data packets associated with a stillimage sent from an aircraft. The system includes a receiver forreceiving a multiplexed data transmission including video stream packetsand image data packets. A demultiplexer is coupled to the receiver. Thedemultiplexer separates the video stream packets and the image datapackets. A video decoder is coupled to the demultiplexer to assemble thevideo packets to produce a video stream. A combiner is coupled to thedemultiplexer to combine the image data packets to form a still image.

Another example is a method of transmitting a still image in a videodata transmission. A still image is captured via a camera. A videostream is captured via the camera. The still image is converted into aplurality of image data packets. The video stream is converted into aplurality of video image packets. The image data packets and video imagepackets are combined into a data transmission. The combined transmissionis sent to a remote receiver. The combined transmission is received on aremote receiver. The combined transmission is demultiplixed into theplurality of image data packets and video image packets. The video imagepackets are decoded into a video stream. The image data packets arecombined into the digital image.

Another example is a system for transmitting data in a first format anddata in a second format to a remote location. The system includes anaircraft having a first sensor to capture data in a first format and asecond sensor to capture data in a second data format. A multiplexer iscoupled to the first and second sensors. The multiplexer produces a datatransmission including the packets of data in the first format and thepackets of data in the second format. A transmitter sends the datatransmission to the remote location.

The foregoing and additional aspects and implementations of the presentdisclosure will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art inview of the detailed description of various embodiments and/or aspects,which is made with reference to the drawings, a brief description ofwhich is provided next.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The foregoing and other advantages of the present disclosure will becomeapparent upon reading the following detailed description and uponreference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a diagram of an example aerial surveillance system includingdrone aircraft and a ground control station;

FIG. 2 is a perspective diagram of the example ground control station inFIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is diagram of the aerial imaging system and ground control systemused to provide a combined video and file image data transmission fromthe aircraft in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a diagram of the video and file image packets combined in adata transmission from the aircraft in FIG. 1;

FIG. 5A is a screen image of a control panel for controlling the ratioof transmission of the video and file image packets;

FIGS. 5B-5D are diagrams of video and file image data packets withdifferent ratios of transmission; and

FIG. 6 is a flow diagram of the process of transmitting a data stream ofvideo frame and still image packets.

While the invention is susceptible to various modifications andalternative forms, specific embodiments have been shown by way ofexample in the drawings and will be described in detail herein. Itshould be understood, however, that the invention is not intended to belimited to the particular forms disclosed. Rather, the invention is tocover all modifications, equivalents, and alternatives falling withinthe spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

FIG. 1 is a diagram of an aerial surveillance system 100 including droneaircraft 102, 104, and 106 and a mobile ground control station 110. Theground control station 110 allocates bandwidth on a single channel toeach of the aircraft 102, 104, and 106 for sending surveillance data tothe ground control station 110. In this example, the ground controlstation 110 may manually control one of the aircraft 102, 104, or 106.The other aircraft 102, 104, and 106 may be programmed in an automaticflight mode to navigate to certain waypoints, hover, and or completeautomated stored flight patterns that do not require human operatorcontrol.

Each of the aircraft 102, 104, and 106 in FIG. 1 include various systemsincluding a structural control system and a flight control system. Boththe structural control system and the flight control system receive datafrom numerous sources. One such source is a communications unitconfigured to receive instructions from a ground controller (e.g., aground-based pilot) operating the ground control station 110. Anothersource is a plurality of flight parameter sensors, preferably includingone or more of the following sensors: a positional sensor (e.g., a GPS),a heading sensor, a pitch sensor, a roll sensor, a yaw sensor, analtimeter, a flight speed sensor, a vertical speed sensor, a slipsensor, a pitch rate sensor, a roll rate sensor, and a yaw rate sensor.A third source is a plurality of structural sensors, preferablyincluding one or more of the following sensors: vertical wing bendingsensors, fore-and-aft wing bending sensors, wing torsion sensors, motorspeed and/or thrust sensors, control surface deflection and/or forcesensors, and solar sensors configured to detect the exposure of thestructure to sunlight. Each of these sensors is of a type either knownin the art (e.g., strain gauges and positional sensors), or that can beformed with a combination of known sensors.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of the mobile ground control station 110 inFIG. 1. The mobile ground control station 110 may be used to manuallypilot the aircraft such as the aircraft 102 in the field and provide thedata output from multiple aircraft. The ground control station 110includes an antenna 112, a transceiver 114, a mast 116, a hub 118, abattery 120, and a mounting tripod 122. The hub 118 provides connectioninterfaces for connecting cables from the transceiver 114 on the mast116. The transceiver 114 receives and transmits signals via the antenna112. In this example, the transceiver has a digital decoder that takes avideo feed from the aircraft 102 and converts it to an analog videofeed. The transceiver also outputs a raw data transmission signal thatmay include both still image data and streaming video data as will bedetailed below.

In this example, the hub 118 includes a memory device for storing stillimages acquired from the aircraft 102 as well as mission data forprogramming flights for the aircraft 102. The hub 118 also provides aconnector interface for cables coupled to a portable computer 130 and ahand controller 140. The hand controller 140 receives the analog videofeed from the transceiver 114 with the hub 118. Of course digital videodata may also be sent to the hand controller 140 from the transceiver114. As will be explained below, the portable computer 130 includes adisplay 132 and includes stored machine instructions to process bothvideo and still images from the aircraft 102, 104, and 106 via thesignals received by the transceiver 114 and display the video or stillimages on the display 132.

The hand controller 140 includes a display 142 that displays video fromthe aircraft for purposes of piloting the aircraft or showing real-timevideo when the aircraft 102 is in automatic flight mode. The handcontroller 140 includes a joystick 144 that may be used to control theaircraft or the positioning of a camera on board the aircraft to acquirevideo or still images. The hand controller 140 includes a throttleswitch 146 that controls the altitude of the aircraft, a multi-functionswitch 148, and an enter key 150 to assist in controlling the aircraft102 in the manual piloting mode.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a video and still image transmission system300 between the aircraft such as the aircraft 102 and the ground controlstation 110 in FIG. 1. The image transmission system 300 includes anon-board video image system 302 and a ground processing system 304. Theon-board video image system 302 includes a CMOS camera 310 that ismounted on the exterior of the aircraft 102 to capture either video orstill images from the ground. In the example aircraft 102, the camera310 is mounted in a rotating turret that permits the camera to bepointed at areas on the ground under the aircraft 102. The CMOS camera310 in this example may produce both still images such as a still imageat a resolution of 5 megapixels and video images, which are at lowerresolution because of the numerous images that comprise a real-timevideo stream. An example of the camera 310 is a 5 megapixel color imagerwith both video and still image output. In this example, the camera 310provides a video stream at a maximum 30 frames per second, although alower frame rate may be used. Of course, those of skill in the artunderstand that higher resolution cameras that capture video at greatermaximum frame rates may be used.

In video mode, the camera 310 converts captured images to raw digitaldata frames that are output to a video encoder 312. The video encoder312 is coupled to a video buffer 314. The camera 310 captures stillimages at a higher resolution, which are sent to a file packet server316. The file packet server 316 divides the captured still image pixeldata into data blocks since a desired image resolution requiresrelatively larger amounts of image data. In this example, the videoencoder 312 is an ASIC coupled to the output of the camera 310. Theon-board image system 302 includes a packet multiplexer 320. The packetmultiplexer 320 has an image file input 322, a video stream input 324and a multiplexed output 326. The input 322 is coupled to the filepacket server 316 and the video stream input 324 is coupled to the videoencoder 312 and the video buffer 314. In this example, an FPGA isconfigured as the video buffer 314, the file packet server 316, and themultiplexer 320. Of course other hardware such as ASICs or generalprocessors or DSPs may be used instead of the FPGA. Each of the separatecomponents 314, 316, and 320 may be on a separate chip or anycombination may be on the same chip.

The multiplexed output 326 of the multiplexer 320 is coupled to a datalink 330, which may be a receiver/transceiver in communication with theground control station 110 in FIG. 1. One example of the data link 330is described in U.S. Publication No. 20110065469 hereby incorporated byreference. The transmissions from the data link 330 may be allocated acertain amount of bandwidth in the broadcast channel to the aircraft 102when the ground control station 110 is controlling multiple aircraft. Inthe case where only one aircraft is controlled by the ground controlstation 110, the entire bandwidth of the broadcast channel is allocatedto the data link 330. The data link 330 sends a multiplexed datatransmission 340 from the aircraft 102 to the ground control station 110in the available bandwidth allocated to the aircraft 102. As shown inFIG. 3, the multiplexed data transmission 340 includes still image fileblocks or packets 342 assembled from the file packet server 316 andtaken from the image file input 322 and video packets or blocks 344assembled from the video buffer 314 and taken from the video input 324.

The ground processing system 304 includes a data link 350, which iscoupled to a packet demultiplexer 352. In this example, the data link350 is a receiver/transmitter device such as the transceiver 114 in FIG.2 in communication with the data link 330 on board the aircraft 102. Thepacket demultiplexer 352 has a video output 354 and a still file output356. The video output 354 is coupled to a video decoder 360, whichassembles the video packets into a stream of video images that may bedisplayed on a display 380 to create a video stream. The display 380 maybe the display 142 on the hand controller 140 or the display 132 on theportable computer 130 or another display. The still file output 356 iscoupled to a file reconstructer 370, which reassembles the receivedblocks into a still image that may be displayed on the display 380. Asshown in FIG. 3, the multiplexed data transmission 340, including bothvideo packets 342 and file packets 340, is separated into video and filepackets by the packet demultiplexer 352. These components are softwaremodules stored and executed by the processor in the portable computer130 in FIG. 1. However, such functions could be performed by a dedicatedDSP, controller, FPGA, etc.

FIG. 4 is a diagram of a video packet such as the video packets 344 anda file transfer packet such as the still image file packet 342 in thedata transmission 340 in FIG. 3. In this example, each of the packets342 or 344 is 188 bytes of data, which are serialized in thetransmission channel to the ground processing system 304. The videopackets 344 include data for the video stream from the video buffer 314in FIG. 3 while the file transfer packets 342 include blocks of a stillimage received by the file packet server 316. The video packet 344 inthis example is formed from the MPEG 2 standard for video streaming. Thevideo packet 344 includes a header field 402 that is 4 bytes thatidentifies the frame as an MPEG 2 type frame. The video packet 344 alsoincludes a video data field 404 that is 184 bytes in length. In thisexample, the MPEG 2 video stream is used for the frame standard and eachblock has a unique number in the header field 402, e.g., a “34” is allvideo, a “24” is audio to identify the data type.

The file transfer packet 342 includes a header field 412, a file IDfield 414, a block ID field 416, a data field 418, and a CRC field 420.In this example, the header field 412 is 4 bytes and is indicative ofthe location of the block within the overall image. The block ID field416 is 2 bytes and identifies the particular file or separate image thatthe block belongs to. The data field 418 is 176 bytes and includes imagedata for the block. The CRC field 420 is 2 bytes long and used as achecksum to validate the data.

The present system allows the transmission of high resolution stillimages during the transmission of a video stream without having tointerrupt the video stream to wait for the download of a still image. Asexplained above, the system 300 takes data packets from both a videostream and a still image and combines them into a multiplexed datatransmission 340 to the ground control station 110.

In operation, the camera 310 in the aircraft 102 will always send avideo feed to the ground control station 110. A user may send commandsvia the transceiver 114 to the aircraft 102 to take a still image orimages from the camera 310 in FIG. 3. The still image produces a largedata file due to the higher resolution that may be received while stillbroadcasting the video stream from the video encoder 312. The aircrafton-board image processing system 302 allows sharing the bandwidth of thetransmission to the ground control station 110 between the still imageor images and the video feed. The combined transmission thereforedownscales the video stream feed by decreasing either or both theresolution and frame rate and intersperses the image file packets in thetransmission. The packet demultiplexer 352 of the ground processingsystem 304 only looks for blocks marked as video for the video decoder360. The file reconstructer 360 grabs the PID field 416 as part of thefile that identifies the block number and reassembles the image byarranging the blocks according to the data in the header field 412. Thereconstructer 370 keeps a log of the received blocks to allow forretransmission of missing blocks from the still image or images andprovide a status of the download of the still image or still images.

A user may decide how much of the bandwidth to share between the videostream and the acquired still image. If the image is a priority, theuser may prioritize file packets and the multiplexer 320 may be thencontrolled to accept more packets from the file packet server 316 inorder to send the image at a faster rate. The user may also control themultiplexer 320 to send less file image packets and more equitably sharethe transmission bandwidth between downloading the image andtransmitting the video stream if the image reception is not of as highimportance. One example of a control of the ratio of video to imagepacket is a slider control interface that is between zero percent videoframes and 100 percent video frames, but other controls may be used. Inthis example, the ground control station 110 will continue to commandminimal sending of video frames at the lowest resolution and the lowestframe rate at zero percent in order to maintain imagery coming from theaircraft which can aid in the control of the aircraft 102 and asituational awareness of the real-time activities occurring on theground. Other examples allow the video transmission to be stopped inorder to maximize the transmission rate of the still images. In otherexamples the ground controller 110 can also adjust the resolution of thestill images to increase the transmission rate of the images and/or toreduce the effect on the video transmission (e.g. minimize the reductionin either the frame rate or the resolution of the video). Also; itshould be noted that the ground controller 110 may control either orboth of the video frame rate and the video resolution.

FIG. 5A is a view of an image of a control panel graphic 500 that may bedisplayed on the display 142 of the ground controller 110 in FIG. 2. Thecontrol panel graphic 500 includes a status field 502, a cancel button504, a quality slider control 506 and a priority slide control 508. Thestatus field 502 displays text that indicates the status of datatransferred by aircraft controlled by the ground controller 110. Thecancel button 504 allows a user to cancel the transfer of data from theaircraft.

The quality slide control 506 allows the user to move the slide betweenlow quality and high quality for the captured image. The high qualitysets the resolution size of the image to the maximum number of pixels ineach direction and the lowest amount of compression. The low qualitysetting sets the resolution size to a low number of pixels and increasescompression to the maximum. The priority slide control 508 variesbetween video and picture. When the slide control of the priority slidecontrol 508 is set at the video setting, transmission of video packetsis given priority while when the slide control is set at the picturesetting, the data image packets are given priority.

FIG. 5B is a diagram of an example of the data transmission to theground controller 110 where the priority slide control 508 is set for agreater priority of transmission of the image (picture). In the exampleshown in FIG. 5B, a much greater number of still image packets 342 areincluded in a transmission 510 than video packets 344.

FIG. 5C is a diagram of an example of the data transmission to theground controller 110 where the priority slide control 508 is set forroughly the same priority of transmission of the image and the video. Inthe example shown in FIG. 5C, a roughly equal number of still imagepackets 342 are included in a transmission 520 as video packets 344.

FIG. 5D is a diagram of an example of the data transmission to theground controller 110 where the priority slide control 508 is set for agreater priority of transmission of the video. In the example shown inFIG. 5D, a much greater number of video packets 344 are included in atransmission 530 than still image packets 342.

The ground station 110 may set up a system of retries. As explainedabove, each still image file is broken into N 182 byte blocks or packetsin this example. In the instance where the aircraft processing system302 reports that it has a file of N blocks to ground, the ground controlstation 110 may prioritize the file solely and halt sending videopackets until all of the blocks of the still image are received.

The ground control station 110 may also allow an operator to dynamicallyallocate bandwidth of the broadcast channel among multiple aircraft. Theground control station 110 may include an arbiter device that decideswhich aircraft is allocated bandwidth based on predetermined factorssuch as maximum payload data output. Alternatively, priority may bedetermined by the operator to allocate bandwidth. Such allocationcontrols are further described in U.S. Publication No. 20110065469.

The components noted in FIG. 3 may be conveniently implemented using oneor more general purpose computer systems, microprocessors, digitalsignal processors, micro-controllers, application specific integratedcircuits (ASIC), programmable logic devices (PLD), field programmablelogic devices (FPLD), field programmable gate arrays (FPGA), and thelike, programmed according to the teachings as described and illustratedherein, as will be appreciated by those skilled in the computer,software, and networking arts.

In addition, two or more computing systems or devices may be substitutedfor any one of the controllers described herein. Accordingly, principlesand advantages of distributed processing, such as redundancy,replication, and the like, also can be implemented, as desired, toincrease the robustness and performance of controllers described herein.The controllers may also be implemented on a computer system or systemsthat extend across any network environment using any suitable interfacemechanisms and communications technologies including, for exampletelecommunications in any suitable form (e.g., voice, modem, and thelike), Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTNs), Packet Data Networks(PDNs), the Internet, intranets, a combination thereof, and the like.

Although the aircraft 102 in this example has a camera such as the CMOScamera 310, the aircraft 102 may include other types of payloads such asradiation detectors, radar, lidar, air samplers, etc. These sensors allhave different types of data that may be transmitted back to the groundto a ground control station such as the ground control station 110.Accordingly, such data may also be combined with either still image orvideo images in the transmission to the ground control station 110according to the examples described above. The ground control station110 may accept transmission of data in a first format and data in asecond format in a multiplexed data transmission. The aircraft such asthe aircraft 102 includes a first sensor to capture data in a firstformat and a second sensor to capture data in a second data format. Thesensors may include diverse sensors such as the cameras, radiationdetectors, radar, lidar, etc. A multiplexer is coupled to the first andsecond sensors and produces a data transmission including the packets ofdata in the first format and the packets of data in the second format. Atransmitter on board the aircraft 102 sends the data transmission to theremote location such as the ground control station 110. The groundcontrol station 110 may control the transmission ratio between the datain the first data format or the second data format depending on thedesired priority.

The operation of the example image and video combination sequence willnow be described with reference to FIGS. 1-4 in conjunction with theflow diagram shown in FIG. 6. The flow diagram in FIG. 6 isrepresentative of example machine readable instructions for transmissionand reception of combined video and still images. In this example, themachine readable instructions comprise an algorithm for execution by:(a) a processor, (b) a controller, and/or (c) one or more other suitableprocessing device(s). The algorithm may be embodied in software storedon tangible and non-transitory media such as, for example, a flashmemory, a CD-ROM, a floppy disk, a hard drive, a digital video(versatile) disk (DVD), or other memory devices, but persons of ordinaryskill in the art will readily appreciate that the entire algorithmand/or parts thereof could alternatively be executed by a device otherthan a processor and/or embodied in firmware or dedicated hardware in awell-known manner (e.g., it may be implemented by an applicationspecific integrated circuit (ASIC), a programmable logic device (PLD), afield programmable logic device (FPLD), a field programmable gate array(FPGA), discrete logic, etc.). For example, any or all of the componentsof the transmission and reception of combined video and still imagescould be implemented by software, hardware, and/or firmware. Also, someor all of the machine readable instructions represented by the flowchartof FIG. 5 may be implemented manually. Further, although the examplealgorithm is described with reference to the flowchart illustrated inFIG. 6, persons of ordinary skill in the art will readily appreciatethat many other methods of implementing the example machine readableinstructions may alternatively be used. For example, the order ofexecution of the blocks may be changed, and/or some of the blocksdescribed may be changed, eliminated, or combined.

FIG. 6 is a flow diagram of the process of capturing and combining stillimage data and a video stream. The video camera 310 first acquires astream of images based on the frame rate for the capturing of a videostream input (600). On receiving a command from the ground controlstation 110, the video camera 310 captures a still image at a higherresolution (602). The captured video stream images are sent to the videoencoder 312 and video buffer 314 (604). The captured still image is sentto the image server (606). The respective image data is packetizedaccording to the respective formats (608). In this example, the videostream is converted into packets according to MPEG 2 video streamstandards while the image data is divided into blocks and assignedheaders for the image and the specific block ID for each image.

The video ratio is then input from the ground control station 110 suchas via the controls on the control panel shown in FIG. 5A (610). Asexplained above, the ground control station 110 allows a user to selectthe amount of either the video stream images or the still image to betransmitted. The video and image data file packets are then multiplexedbased on inputs from the video buffer 314 and the file packet server 316according to the ratio received (612). The multiplexed data packets arethen transmitted to the ground control station 110 (614). The receivedmultiplexed data transmission is then demultiplexed by the demultiplexer352 to create outputs of video packets and still image packets (616).The video packets are streamed to the decoder 360 to be assembled in avideo stream (618). The video stream output from the decoder 360 is theninput to a display such as the display 380 to display the video (620).The image file packets are assembled by the file reconstructer 370 intothe still image (622). The still image may also be sent to the displayfor presentation to the user (624).

While particular implementations and applications of the presentdisclosure have been illustrated and described, it is to be understoodthat the present disclosure is not limited to the precise constructionand compositions disclosed herein and that various modifications,changes, and variations can be apparent from the foregoing descriptionswithout departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as definedin the appended claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. A system for transmitting still images and avideo feed to a remote location, the system comprising: an aircraftincluding a digital video camera to capture still images and videoframes of an object; a video encoder coupled to the camera to provide avideo output including video packets; a file server coupled to thecamera to provide a still image output including image data packets; amultiplexer coupled to the video output and the still image output, themultiplexer producing a data transmission including the video packetsand the image data packets; and a transmitter to send the datatransmission to the remote location.
 2. The system of claim 1 furthercomprising: a ground station receiver at the remote location to receivethe data transmission; a demultiplexer coupled to the receiver todemultiplex the video packets and the image data packets from the datatransmission; a video decoder coupled to the demultiplexer to output thevideo stream; and a combiner coupled to the demultiplexer to combine theimage data packets in the still image.
 3. The system of claim 1, whereinthe multiplexer is controlled to combine a predetermined ratio of videopackets to image data packets in the data transmission.
 4. The system ofclaim 1, wherein the still image is one of a plurality of still imagescaptured by the camera, the image data packets including an identifierfield identifying the still image associated with the image data packet.5. The system of claim 1, wherein the multiplexer includes an image onlymode which sets the rate of video images to a minimum number of framesper second and a minimum resolution.
 6. A system for receiving acombined data transmission of video stream packets and image datapackets associated with a still image sent from an aircraft, the systemcomprising: a receiver for receiving a multiplexed data transmissionincluding video stream packets and image data packets; a demultiplexercoupled to the receiver, the demultiplexer to separate the video streampackets and the image data packets; a video decoder coupled to thedemultiplexer to assemble the video packets to produce a video stream;and a combiner coupled to the demultiplexer to combine the image datapackets to form a still image.
 7. The system of claim 6, furthercomprising a display coupled to the video decoder and the combiner todisplay the video stream or the still image.
 8. The system of claim 6,further comprising: an aircraft including a digital video camera tocapture a still image and video frames of an object; a video encodercoupled to the camera to provide a video output including video packets;a file server coupled to the camera to provide an still image outputincluding image data packets; a multiplexer coupled to the video outputand the still image output, the multiplexer producing the datatransmission including the video packets and the image data packets; anda transmitter to send the data transmission to the remote location. 9.The system of claim 8, wherein the multiplexer is controlled to combinea predetermined ratio of video packets to image data packets in the datatransmission.
 10. The system of claim 8, wherein the still image is oneof a plurality of still images captured by the camera, the image datapackets including an identifier field identifying the still imageassociated with the image data packet.
 11. The system of claim 8,wherein the multiplexer includes an image only mode which sets the rateof video images to a minimum number of frames per second and a minimumresolution.
 12. A method of transmitting a still image in a video datatransmission, the method comprising: capturing a still image via acamera; capturing a video stream via the camera; converting the stillimage into a plurality of image data packets; converting the videostream into a plurality of video image packets; combining the image datapackets and video image packets into a data transmission; sending thecombined transmission to a remote receiver; receiving the combinedtransmission on the remote receiver; demultiplexing the combinedtransmission into the plurality of image data packets and video imagepackets; decoding the video image packets into a video stream; andcombining the image data packets into the digital image.
 13. The methodof claim 12, wherein the combined transmission accepts a ratio of videopackets to digital image packets.
 14. The method of claim 12, furthercomprising displaying the digital image.
 15. The method of claim 12,wherein the camera is mounted on an aircraft and the receiver isincluded in a ground station.
 16. The method of claim 12, wherein thestill image is one of a plurality of still images captured by thecamera, the image data packets including an identifier field identifyingthe still image associated with the image data packet.
 17. A system fortransmitting data in a first format and data in a second format to aremote location, the system comprising: an aircraft including a firstsensor to capture data in a first format and a second sensor to capturedata in a second data format; a multiplexer coupled to the first andsecond sensors, the multiplexer producing a data transmission includingthe packets of data in the first format and the packets of data in thesecond format; and a transmitter to send the data transmission to theremote location.
 18. The system of claim 17, wherein the first andsecond data formats are one of a group of still images, video images,radiation, radar, lidar, or air samples.
 19. The system of claim 17,wherein the multiplexer is controlled by the remote location to send theratio of data in the first format and the data in the second format toprioritize either the data in the first or second format.